By Portia Williams
LUCASVILLE — Emmanuel United Methodist Church (UMC), located at 73 Scioto Street in Lucasville, recently expanded their booth at the Scioto County Fair with renovations totaling $40,000. Melanie Hawk, a member of Emmanuel UMC, said they wanted more space to better serve the public.
“What we have done in order to serve the public better, we are serving cafeteria style, and offering them a sitting arrangement where it is bright, and cheerful,” Hawk said. “We can now accommodate the public so much better, and that is our goal. We want to serve quality food, and we want to be able to meet the public’s needs.”
According to Hawk, they are now able to hold a seating capacity of 80 at one time for dining. Craig Thompson is the contractor who performed the work on Emmanuel UMC’s booth. She said some members of the church assisted in the project as well.
She said they were delighted to have be able to accommodate a group that came in from one of the local assisted living facilities, which had a party of 15 guests in wheelchairs.
“Having the renovations, and making it more accessible, is really what we desire. We were able to accommodate each and every one of them, and they were all in wheelchairs, and they were elderly,” she said. “We were able to have them sit at a table. They would have never been able to have done that in our old booth. So, they were all able to sit and have a meal together. We really want to be able to serve the larger groups and families that come in, and hopefully it is cooler. We are a church affiliated booth, so we want to be able to serve our guests not just the food, but to be a good representation of our church, and taking care of people.”
Hawk said the Scioto County Fair is a nice place, with a great group of people serving on the board.
“I think that they do an excellent job at the Scioto County Fair. It is the nicest, cleanest place; the fair board,” Hawk said. “We should be very proud of our Scioto County Fair.”
Emmanuel UMC church services are Sunday at 9:30 a.m with Sunday School and Worship Service at 10:40 a.m.
Christ’s Sanctuary, 418 Harding Avenue in Portsmouth has had an operative booth at the Scioto County Fair for the last three years. Pastor Steve Phipps, said serving at the fair is a wonderful experience.
“This year has been wonderful because it is our third year. Simply, this is our third fair, and after we close the fair this year we will be in the black, we will have everything paid off, and our purpose for buying this was to support our building fund efforts, so we are going to be doing that now from here on out,” Phipps said. “So, God has truly blessed us.”
He said the members of Christ Sanctuary make it possible for the booth to operate smoothly.
“The volunteers here are members of our church, they are managers, people who help to manage the booth. Dan Leesburg and Yvonne Patterson oversee the leadership as far as ordering, organizing and things like that,” Phipps said. “Then, we have a host of people who volunteer. We have two shifts per day, they are long, but it works. People are willing to come and put the time in to help the church make the money.”
Christ Sanctuary provides a full menu for fair goers that choose to visit their booth.
“We bought this off of the Valley Methodist Church, and they had this booth for many years. Their famous serving was the grilled half chicken, which we have maintained. We have taken that same recipe for that chicken, and we’ve adopted it and have kept that history going,” he said. “Other than that, we sell items like the hamburgers and hot dogs, country fried steak, ham and beans and corn bread, the traditional fair-going type food.”
He said he is already looking forward to serving at the fair next year.
“I love this. Me and my brother, who is usually here both really love this environment,” he said. “Being at the fair, serving people, fixing good people is something that I enjoy a lot, and I look forward to next year,” he said.
Service times at Christ Sanctuary are Sunday at 10:30 a.m. and Wednesday at 7 p.m.
Reach Portia Williams at 740-353-3101, ext. 1929, or on Twitter @PortiaWillPDT.
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